/    ._    C  Duke   University   Libraries 

*•***  +  Speech  of  Josep 

^p  Conf  Pam  12mo  #391 

f&m'  Dcnlsssb7^ 
#351 


/ 


SPEECH 

O  F 

JOSEPH  SEGAR,  ESQ., 


OF    THE   YORK   DISTRICT, 


DELIVERED    IN    THE 

pouse  of  Relegates  of  Virginia, 

MARCH  THE  30TH,  1861, 


RESOLUTIONS  OF  THE  SENATE,  DIRECTING  THE  GOVERNOR 

OF  VIRGINIA  TO  SEIZE,  BY  MILITARY  FORCE,  THE 

U.  S.  GUNS  AT  BELLONA  ARSENAL,  AND 

ON  THE  SECESSION  OF  VIRGINIA. 


K  «/<: 


I* 


SPEECH. 


"  TF^r^s,  It  has  come  to  the  knowledge  of  the  Legislature 
that  a  large  number  of  heavy  guns,  manufactured  at  Bellona 
foundry,  near  the  capital  of  Virginia,  under  an  order  of  the 
Ordnance  Department  at  Washington,  D.  C,  have  been  or- 
dered to  Fortress  Monroe,  where  they  can  only  be  needed  for 
the  purpose  of  intimidation  and  menace  to  Virginia  at  present, 
and  of  actual  hostilities  in  a  certain  contingency  that  may 
change  her  future  relations  to  the  federal  government  and  the 
non-slaveholding  tyranny  it  represents  : 

"  Be  it  Resolved  faj  the  General  Assembly,  That  the  Gover- 
nor of  this  Commonwealth  be  authorized,  and  he  is  hereby 
directed,  to  order  out  the  public  guard,  and  to  call  out  such  of 
the  militia  as  may  be  necessary  to  arrest  the  contemplated  re- 
moval of  the  guns  aforesaid,  and  that  he  be  further  instructed 
to  employ  all  needful  force  to  resist  every  and  any  attempt  to 
remove  the  same  beyond  the  reach  and  the  control  of  the  gov- 
ernment of  the  State. 

The  foregoing  resolution,  and  others  of  like  tenor,  being  un- 
der consideration,  Mr.  Segar  said : 

I  call  you  to  witness,  Mr.  Speaker,  that  hitherto  I  have  been 
strictly  silent  as  to  the  great  questions  of  federal  import  that 
have  been  discussed  off  and  on  during  the  session ;  but  the  ex- 

P33537 


traordinary  resolutions  which  have  been  sent  ns  from  the  Sen- 
ate forbid  my  longer  silence.  They  direct  the  Governor  to 
seize  and  hold,  by  military  force,  the  property  of  the  United 
States,  and  I  cannot  sustain  them.  I  would — so  help  me,  God ! 
■ — sooner  die  in  my  seat  than  cast  my  vote  for  them. 

I  maintain,  first,  that  there  is  no  adequate  cause  for  the  in- 
tense excitement  which  has  sprung  from  this  matter,  and,  of 
course,  no  necessity  for  the  adoption  of  the  resolutions  ;  sec- 
ondly, that  we  have  no  moral  nor  legal  right  to  pass  them ; 
thirdly,  that  the  seizure  will  be  an  act  of  war  ;  and,  finally, 
that  the  great  alarm  pervading  the  country,  and  the  revolu- 
tionary action  of  the  secession  party  in  this  State  and  of  the 
States  actually  seceded,  find  no  just  warrant  in  the  facts  of  the 
case. 

All  this  stir  about  the  removal  of  the  guns  from  Bellona 
arsenal,  it  seems  to  me,  is  wholly  uncalled  for.  It  scarcely 
rises  to  the  dignity  of  a  "  tempest  in  a  teapot."  What  are  the 
facts  ?  In  1857,  the  government,  through  Secretary  Floyd, 
contracted  with  Dr.  Archer  for  sundry  cannon,  to  be  delivered 
in  Richmond.  The  very  date  of  the  contract  exonerates  the 
government  from  all  sinister  purpose  in  reference  to  the  guns. 
The  guns  having  been  made,  the  contractor  wanted  his  money, 
and  applied  for  payment.  To  his  application  it  was  replied, 
that  on  full  compliance  with  his  contract,  by  the  delivery  of 
the  guns  in  Richmond,  the  money  would  be  paid ;  and  the 
head  of  the  Ordnance  Department  accordingly  advised  Dr. 
Archer  to  deliver  the  guns  to  Colquitt  &  Co.,  in  Richmond, 
to  be  by  them  re-shipped  to  Fortress  Monroe,  the  chief  depos- 
itory in  Virginia  for  national  arms  and  munitions  of  war.  So 
the  first  movement  of  the  guns  had  its  origin  in  a  simple  act 
of  indebtedness  of  the  government  to  a  citizen  of  Virginia,  in 
need  of  and  demanding  his  money.  In  such  a  movement  no 
hostile  intention  can  be  detected.  It  was  but  the  doing  of  an 
ordinary  act  in  the  ordinary  routine  of  the  business  of  a  bu- 
reau of  the  War  Office ;  and  it  was  done  on  the  responsibility 
of  the  head  of  the  bureau,  without  any  consultation  with,  or 
any  regular  military  order  from,  the  head  of  the  War  Depart- 
ment— which  at  once  negatives  the  idea  of  any  inconsistency 


"between  the  statement  of  the  officer  of  the  Ordnance  Depart- 
ment and  that  of  the  Secretary  of  War,  and  folly  relieves  the 
latter  functionary  of  the  charges  of  duplicity  and  falsehood  so 
vehemently  pressed  by  the  gentleman  from  Madison  (General 
Kemper)  and  others,  who  seem  resolved  to  find  in  this  insigni- 
ficant affair  something  monstrous  and  unendurable. 

The  following  letters — which  I  will  read  to  the  House — ex- 
plain clearly  the  whole  transaction,  and  will  remove  all  ground 
for  panic.  First,  a  letter  from  Col.  Craig,  Chief  of  the  Ord- 
nance Bureau,  to  Dr.  Archer,  of  date  the  22d  of  March,  which 
is  as  follows : 

"  You  will  please  forward  to  Richmond  the  cannon  at  your 
foundry  which  has  been  inspected  hy  the  United  Slates,  with  as 
little  delay  as  possible  ;    and  as  soon  as  they  are  shipped  from 
that  place,  the  amount  due  on  the  inspection  will  be  paid" 

Secondly,  a  letter,  from  Capt.  Kingsbury,  of  the  Ordnance 
Department,  dated  March  the  28th,  and  addressed  to  my 
friend  Mr.  A.  M.  Barbour,  a  member  of  the  convention,  which 
is  in  these  words  : 

"Col.  Craig  wishes  me  to  say  that  Br.  Archer  will  be  directed 
to-day  not  to  remove  the  guns  at  present.  The  movement  has 
•been  commenced,  in  order  that  the  cttizens  of  Virginia  might 
receive  their  dues  from  the  United  States  ;  and  as  the  contract 
was  completed,  it  seemed  a  fitting  time  to  send  forward  the 
guns." 

The  Secretary  of  War,  as  stated  by  him  in  letters  to  myself, 
and  another  member  of  the  House,  (Col.  3VTCue),  made  no  or- 
der in  the  premises,  but  whatever  was  done,  was  the  indepen- 
dent action  of  the  Ordnance  Bureau,  in  its  ordinary  course  of 
business,  and  that  action  ^as  nothing  more  nor  less  than  the 
taking  of  proper  steps  by  the  proper  bureau  to  liquidate 
a  debt  due  by  the  Government  to  a  citizen — a  transaction  of 
daily  occurrence  in  the  business  operations  of  the  various  bu- 
reaus in  the  several  chief  departments  of  the  government. 
•Gentlemen  evidently  confound  the  action  of  Col.  Craig  and 
that  of  the  Secretary  of  War,  supposing  that  the  Ordnance 

P33537 


6 

Division  does  no  official  act  without  an  express  order  from 
the  Secretary,  and  this  confusion  of  ideas  has  doubtless  led  to 
the  harsh  aspersions  which  have  been  applied  in  this  debate 
to  the  latter. 

Thus  far,  then,  the  facts  offer  no  ground  for  the  supposition 
that  the  government  designed  to  employ  the  guns  against  Vir- 
ginia, or  for  menace,  or  for  any  improper  use.  And  it  is  con- 
clusive against  any  unfriendly  or  war-like  intent,  that  the 
Ordnance  Department,  on  being  apprised  that  the  removal  of 
the  guns  had  provoked  excitement,  forthwith  notified  Dr. 
Archer  not  to  move  them  at  all.  What  cause,  then,  is  there 
for  the  panic  that  sounds  its  busy  din  in  this  hall  and  in  the 
streets  of  this  city  1  or  for  the  passage  of  these  harsh  and  il- 
legal resolutions  ?  Besides,  Gen.  Scott  has  said  that  there  is 
no  need  for  the  guns  at  Fortress  Monroe,  there  being  a  large 
number  of  supernumary  guns  already  there. 

The  simple  truth  is,  that  the  guns  were  to  be  sent  to  Fort- 
ress Monroe  because  it  is  the  only  convenient  depot  to  receive 
them.  It  ;s  not  only  the  most  natural  and  proper  place  to 
send  them  to,  but  the  only  one  in  the  State  within  convenient 
reach.  The  panic,  therefore,  which  has  arisen  from  these 
simple  circumstances  is  totally  groundless,  and  is,  I  must  say, 
unworthy  the  chivalry  of  Virginia.  It  can  have  no  effect 
but  to  scare  timid  women  and  children,  and  does  not 
become  grown  up  and  bearded  men  ;  and  if  this  legislature, 
under  provocation  so  slight  and  circumstances  so  trivial,  shall 
adopt  these  resolves,  they  will  provoke  the  contempt  of  the 
brave  and  chivalrous  throughout  the  land. 

And,  after  all,  is  not  all  this  outcry  about  these  guns  one 
in  a  series  of  devices  designed  to  precipitate  Virginia  into 
secession?  Sir,  I  verily  believe  it;  for  I  have  too  much  re- 
spect for  Virginia  and  Virginians  to  suppose  that  they  can  be 
frightened  by  the  moving  of  a  few  guns  from  Bellona  Arsenal 
to  Fortress  Monroe. 

No ;  it  is  nothing  more  nor  less  than  the  driving  of  a  peg 
to  hang  excitement  and  panic  on — an  ingenious  scheme  of 
frenzied  disunionists  to  effect,  by  the  exasperation  of  the  pub- 


lie  mind,  already  strung  to  a  high  pitch,  the  darling  object  of 
their  mad  desires :  the  secession  of  the  State,  and  a  thorough 
disruption  of  the  Union.  Outside  pressure  they  know  to  be 
indispensable  to  the  accomplishment  of  their  unholy  purpose  ; 
and  this  matter  of  the  Bellona  guns  is  too  tempting  a  theme 
for  sensation  to  be  passed  over  without  an  effort  to  turn  it  to 
account. 

Secondly,  this  General  Assembly,  with  all  its  powers,  has 
no  right  to  pass  these  resolutions.     The  guns  are  the  property 
of  the  United  States  government — that   all   admit.     Fortress 
Monroe,  to  which  locality  they  were  to  have  been  transported, 
is  also  the  property  of  the  United  States.     Virginia,  by  solemn 
act  of  Assembly,  and  by  formal  deed,  duly  recorded  in  the 
Clerk's  office  of  my  County  (and  which  I  have  often  read), 
ceded  and  transferred  "  all  her  right,  title,  and  interest  of,  in, 
and  to  the  lands  at  old  Point  Comfort  to  the  United  States,  for 
purposes  of  fortification  and  national  defence."  Then,  if  the  guns 
are  the  property  of  the  United  States,  and  old  Point  Comfort  is 
also  the  property  of  the  United  States,  what  right,  moral  or 
legal,  has  Virginia  to  lay  her  hands  upon  the  guns,  or  to  hin- 
der the  transfer  of  them  to  the  lands  of  the  United  States  '.    A 
man  takes  and  carries  away  for  his  own  use  my  horse,  and  the 
law  pronounces   it   larceny  —  in   plainer   language,  stealing. 
Now,  what  difference,  I  beg  to  know,  is  there,  either  in  morals 
or  in  law,  between  the  act   of  an  individual  illegally  taking 
and  carrying  away  another's  property,  and  that  of  a  State 
doing  the  same  thing  \     Do  we  make  the  matter  better  by 
paying  for  the  guns  after  they  have  been  seized  \     Not  at  all ; 
for  the  wrong  is  in  the  seizure  and  appropriation.     If  a  man 
steals  my  cow,  does  he,  by  tendering  payment  after  the  steal- 
ing, escape  the  moral  infamy  or  legal  penalty  of  the  act  { 

Sir,  I  shall  regard  the  passage  of  these  resolutions  as  a  foul 
stigma  upon  the  good  name  of  our  State.  It  will  blot  her  es- 
cutcheon dark  and  deep  forever.  God  forbid  she  should  do 
the  dishonorable  and  dishonoring  deed !  I  trust  she  is  quite 
too  proud — too  mindful  of  her  past  renown — to  imitate  the 
example  of  those  of  her  erring  sisters  who  have  not  scrupled 
to  lay  violent  hands  on  the  forts,  and  dock-yards,  and  ships, 
and  cannon,  and  muskets,  and  balls,  and  powder,  and  even  the 


8 

mints  and  money  of  the  United  States.     Mr.  Speaker,  these 
guns  are  not  ours — let  us  not  take  them. 

I  presume  the  extremest  secessionist  will  scarcely  contend 
that  the  United  States  must  first  obtain  the  consent  of 
the  State  before  transporting  guns  over  her  territory.  No 
such  consent  can  be  required.  The  government  of  the  Union 
has  the  power  to  declare  war,  and  to  raise  and  maintain  armies 
and  navies.  It  has,  in  other  words,  and  has  exclusively,  the 
war-making  power  ;  and  from  this  power  results,  by  irresistible 
deduction  and  necessity,  the  right  to  transport  all  implements 
and  materials  of  war,  to  march  troops  through  the  territories 
r  of  any  and  all;  States,  to  navigate,  with  the  national  ships, 
all  the  navigable  waters  within  them,  and  to  anchor  its  ship- 
ping in  any  port  or  harbor  within  their  territorial  limits,  and 
without  asking  leave  of  the  State  authorities. 

I  shall  not  undertake  to  say  that  there  can  be  no  circum- 
stances under  which  the  State  might  properly  take  pos- 
session of  the  cannon.  If  she  were  at  war  with  the  Federal 
Goverment  on  account  of  palpable  and  insufferable  oppres" 
sion,  and  if  by  a  revolution  inaugurated  to  break  the  shackles 
of  that  oppression,  she  had  dissolved  all  connexion  with  that 
government  (as  did  our  fathers'  in  the  Revolution),  the  princi- 
ples of  self-defence  and  the  inexorable  necessities  of  the  case 
might  justify  the  act.  But  we  are  not  at  war  with  the  Fed- 
eral Government ;  our  connexion  with  it  is  yet  undissolved; 
Virginia  is  still  in  the  Union,  and  being  yet  a  member  of  the 
Confederacy,  she  is  bound  by  all  the  duties  and  responsibili- 
of  that  membership.  Observing  those  duties  and  responsibil- 
ities, she  cannot  seize  and  appropriate  to  herself  property  that 
is  held  for  national  purposes — for  the  common  defence — that, 
in  other  words,  belongs  to  the  Union  or  the  common  govern 
ment. 

Thirdly,  the  seizure  of  the  guns  by  the  State  would  be  an 
act  of  war  against  the  Federal  Government.  The  taking  of 
the  property  of  one  nation  by  another  has  always  been  re- 
garded just  cause  of  war,  If  I  go  into  the  port  of  Liver- 
pool with  my  vessel,  and  the  British  Government  seize  it,  it 
is  an  act  which  would  justify  war  upon  Great  Britain,  and 


9 

would  lead  to  it  if  the  wrong  should  not  be  redressed.  Will 
it  not,  then,  be  an  act  of  war  on  the  part  of  Virginia  if  she 
should  seize  and  appropriate  to  herself  the  property  of  the 
the  United  States  \  And  in  this  view,  is  not  the  act  an  un- 
constitutional act  \  Congress  (as  already  said)  alone  can 
raise  and  maintain  armies  and  navies,  and  declare  war — 
do  acts  of  war.  Can  Virginia,  while  she  remains  in  the 
Union,  declare  war  or  do  any  act  of  war  \  I  solemnly  think 
the  passage  of  the  resolutions  will  involve  an  unconsti- 
tutional act,  but  trust  the  State  will  not  tarnish  her  fair 
fame  by  its  perpetration.  Let  not  her  honor  be  thus  sullied. 
Let  the  jewel  of  that  honor  sparkle,  and  sparkle  on,  now  as 
heretofore,  lustrous,  and  more  lustrous  yet,  now,  henceforth, 
and  forever !  And  the  inconsistency  of  the  thing,  is  it  not  ap- 
parent \  ^Ye  profess  to  desire  peace,  to  avoid  a  collision 
with  the  Federal  Government.  The  secessionists  themselves 
all  the  time  avow  that  such  is  their  desire.  And  yet,  while 
we  all  profess  to  desire  peace,  to  avoid  collision,  Ave  pro- 
pose to  do,  ourselves,  acts  decidedly  war-like — acts  that  in- 
vite collision  and  the  destruction  of  peace. 

Another  objection  I  may  here  take  to  the  passage  of  the 
resolutious,  that  it  will  much  increase  the  excitement  and 
panic  already  existing  through  the  State,  and  so  existing  more 
by  misapprehension  and  the  ceaseless  efforts  of  a  sensation 
press,  than  for  any  just  and  sufficient  cause.  It  will  alarm 
unnecessarily  the  innocent  women  and  the  plain  yeomanry  of 
the  State,  who  have  little  time  to  investigate  matters  of  pub- 
lic concern,  and  will  lead  to  general  disquiet.  The  adoption 
of  the  resolutions  will  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of  license  to  the 
wicked  elements  among  us.  Besides  the  mass  of  conscien- 
tious and  honorable  secessionists,  there  is  in  this  State,  as  in 
all  others,  a  class  who  desire  revolution  because  they  may 
be  benefitted  and  cannot  be  injured  by  change — that  class 
so  well  described  by  the  historian  Salust  as  studiosi  novarum 
rerum — desirous  of  change — because,  in  the  general  upheav- 
ing of  society,  they  might  come  to  the  surface,  and  be  bet- 
tered in  their  condition.  This  class  long  for  collision  and 
blood,  because  they  know  well  that  the  first  clash  between 
the  State  and  Federal  muskets — the  first  drop  of  blood  that 


10 

collision  spills — will  enkindle  a  flame  that  will  light  them 
on  to  the  accomplishment  of  their  foul,  hellish  purposes  of 
blood  and  carnage.  This  class  would,  in  a  mere  spirit  of 
adventure,  fire  the  very  temples  of  liberty,  and  dash  into 
fragments  that  proudest  and  noblest  monument  of  human 
wisdom — the  union  of  these  States — the  handiwork  of  Wash- 
ington, and  Franklin,  and  Madison,  and  Gerry,  and  Morris, 
and  comrade  conscript  fathers — under  which  we  have  been 
the  proudest,  freest,  happiest,  greatest  nation  on  the  face  of  t~/ut> 
earth.  This  class  does  exist  in  Virginia.  It  exists  all  over 
the  civilized  earth,  and  it  is  no  detraction  from  Virginia  to 
say  that  it  exists  within  her  domain  ;  she  would  be  an  ex- 
ception to  all  human  societ}^  if  she  did  not  hold  in  her  bosom 
such  a  class.  Now  all  this  class  will  be  stimulated  by  the 
passage  of  these  revolutionary,  and  force-inviting,  and  law- 
less resolutions,  to  deeds  of  lawlessness,  violence,  and  blood. 
Let  this  legislature  beware  how  it  holds  out  the  seductive 
bait.  It  may  encamp  us  on  a  mine,  which  a  spark  may  ex- 
plode, and  the  explosion  of  which  may  "deal  damnation 
round  the  land,"  and  involve  the  fathers  and  mothers,  and 
husbands  and  wives,  and  sons  and  daughters,  and  brothers 
and  sisters,  and  innocent  children  of  Virginia  in  miseries  and 
woes  unnumbered,  and  the  end  whereof  none  of  the  present 
generation  may  live  to  see. 

Lastly,  there  is  nothing  in  the  past  political  action  of  Vir- 
ginia, nor  anything  in  the  past  or  present  relations  between 
her  and  the  Federal  Government,  to  justify  the  extreme  and 
revolutionary  movement  the  secessionists  propose  for  her,  and 
which  is  plainly  shadowed  in  the  resolutions  before  us. 

In  1798  she  fixed  her  great  general  rule — that  the  Federal 
Government  should  not  be  resisted  until  it  had  kcommitted 
some  "  deliberate,  palpable,  and  dangerous"  infraction  of  the 
Constitution.  What  infraction  of  this  sort  has  been  commit- 
ted by  the  Federal  Government  ?  What  is  it — where  is  it — 
when  was  it  committed  ?  Has  the  present  administration 
perpetrated  any  such  aggression  ?  And  if  the  seceding  States 
had  remained  in  the  Union,  could  Congress,  with  twenty-one 
majority  in  one  House,  and  eight  in  the  other,  have  commit- 


11 

ted  any  outrage  upon  the  rights  of  Virginia,  or  of  the  South  ? 
Virginia,  then,  on  her  own  established  principles  of  political 
action,  ought  not  now  to  present  the  spectacle  she  does  of 
extreme  excitement,  and  ought  not,  and  cannot,  consistently, 
rush  upon  the  violent  and  unconstitutional  measures  involved 
in  these  Senate  resolutions,  much  less  secede  from  the  Union. 
She  ought — it  becomes  her  dignity  and  her  ancient  renown — 
to  look  calmly,  even  placidly,  around  her,  and,  from  the 
stand-point  of  that  dignity  and  renown,  surveying  the  whole 
ground,  consider  and  advise,  and  remonstrate  and  lorbear, 
and  forbear  yet  again,  until  every  pacific  and  constitutional 
expedient  for  composition  and  safety  shall  have  been  exhaust- 
ed. And  furthermore  :  these  radical  measures  of  seizing  the 
United  States  arms,  and  seceding  from  the  Union,  are  totally 
unwarranted  by  the  more  recent  political  action  of  Virginia, 
In  1850,  when  the  subject  of  the  AVilmot  Proviso  was  up  for 
consideration  in  her  Legislature,  she  took  a  new  position. 
She  declared  that  if  any  one  of  four  things  should  be  done 
by  the  Federal  Government,  she  would  **  resist  at  all  haz- 
ards, and  to  the  last  extremity":  first,  the  application  of  the 
AVilmot  Proviso  to  the  common  territories;  secondly,  the 
abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia;  thirdly,  in- 
terference with  slavery  in  the  States:  and,  fourthly,  inter- 
ference with  the  slave  trade  between  the  States.  Has 
any  one  of  these  things  been  done  1  Has  the  AVilmot  Pro- 
viso been  applied  to  the  Territories  '{  No.  On  the  contrary, 
at  the  late  session  of  Congress,  though  it  had,  by  the  seces- 
sion of  the  Gulf  States,  a  clear  majority,  that  body,  Black 
Republican  as  it  is,  passed  three  Territorial  bills — from  all 
of  which  the  Wilmot  Proviso  was  excluded — no  slavery  pro- 
hibition whatsoever  ;  and  more  than  this,  a  provision  was  in- 
corporated in  each  of  them  that  all  rights  of  property  questions 
of  personal  freedom  should  be  determined  by  the  principles 
and  proceedings  of  the  common  law,  with  the  right  of  appeal 
to  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States — provisions  that 
open  the  Territories  to  every  citizen  of  the  Union  who 
may  choose  to  carry  his  slaves  thither.  The  Black  Repub- 
licans, as  my  friend  from  Stafford  so  delights,  with  peculiar 
emphasis,  to  call  them,  have  themselves  surrendered,  given 
up  the  Wilmot  Proviso.     And  had  the  Cotton  States  remain- 


12 

ed  in  the  Union,  could  this  Black  Republican  party,  with  its 
minority  of  twenty-one  in  one  house  and  eight  in  the  other, 
have  ever  applied  the  Wilmot  Proviso  to  the  Territories  that 
belong  to  us  all,  "  share  and  share  alike  ?"  No  law,  then, 
has  been  passed,  applying  the  Wilmot  Proviso.  Has  any 
been  enacted  abolishing  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia] 
No.  Even  Mr.  Lincoln  assures  us  that  he  will  approve  no 
such  law,  except  with  the  consent  of  the  slaveholders  of  the 
District,  and  then  not  without  compensation  to  the  own- 
ers. Has  any  law  been  passed  interfering  with  slavery  in 
the  States  ?  Not  at  all.  Such  a  doctrine  is  not  even  in 
the  Chicago  platform.  Mr.  Lincoln,  Mr.  Seward,  Mr.  Caleb 
B.  Smith,  Attorney-General  Bates,  Senator  Wilson,  and  all  the 
chief  men  of  the  Republican  party  repudiate  it — none  main- 
tain it  but  professed  and  extreme  abolitionists,  such  as  Gerritt 
Smith,  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  Wm,  Lloyd  Garrison,  Arthur 
Tappan,  Charles  Sumner,  and  Wendall  Phillips,  whose  fanat- 
ical and  wicked  efforts,  backed  by  all  the  aid  they  can  enlist 
from  the  rank  and  file  of  pure  abolitionism,  can  never  any 
more  disturb  or  harm  the  institution  of  slavery  in  the  States 
than  the  zephyr's  breath  can  unseat  the  everlasting  hills,  and 
whose  impotent  assaults  upon  the  constitutional  rights  of  the 
South  and  on  the  Constitution  and  the  Union,  not  sympa- 
thized in  by  the  great  mass  of  the  Northern  people — on  the 
contrary,  expressly  disavowed  by  near  two  millions  of  con- 
servative voters  of' the  North  at  the  late  Presidential  elec- 
tion— should  be  laughed  to  scorn  by  the  Southern  people, 
and  heeded  only  "  as  the  idle  wind  that  passeth  by."  I  re- 
peat, there  is  no  such  doctrine  in  the  Chicago  platform  ;  and 
— what,  in  my  judgment,  ought  forever  to  quiet  Southern  ap- 
prehension in  regard  to  slavery  in  the  States,  and  even  else- 
where— at  the  late  session  of  Congress — in  which,  by  the  se- 
cession of  the  Gulf  States  (as  already  stated),  the  Republi- 
cans have  the  majority — a  resolution  was  adopted  by  the 
necessary  constitutional  majority,  recommending  an  amend- 
ment to  the  Constitution,  whereby,  hereafter,  interference 
with  slavery  in  the  States  by  the  Federal  Government  is  to 
be  totally  and  forever  forbidden.  Not  one,  then,  of  the  four 
things  has  been  done  for  which  Virginia  said  she  would 
withdraw  from  the  Union.     Why,  then,  all  this  hot  excite- 


13 

ment,  and  this  hot  haste  to  get  out  of  the  Union.  Has  the 
proposition  to  interfere  with  the  slave  trade  between  the 
States  been  ever  heard  of  in  Congress,  or  has  it  been  even 
talked  about  except  by  the  worst  class  of  abolitionists? 
Can  Virginia,  on  her  own  principles,  (so  far  as  the  ques- 
tion of  slavery  is  concerned)  proceed  hastily  to  extreme 
measures  of  resistance,  or  to  the  adoption  of  the  seizure  and 
-appropriation  proposed  by  the  resolutions  before  us  ? 

Verily,  if  her  sons  in  this  Hall,  who  are  constituted  the 
special  guardians  ofjier  honor,  regard  her  consistency  as  one 
of  her  jewels,  they  will  make  that  jewel  glow  all  the  brighter 
by  voting  down  these  shame-bringing  resolutions,  and  repu- 
diating secession  until,  on  her  own  solemnly  avowed  princi- 
ples, the  hour  for  resistance  and  revolution  shall  have  come. 

Beyond  all  this,  I  desire  to  be  informed  what  wrong  has 
been  done  me,  or  any  citizen  of  the  South,  or  the  South  at 
large,  by  that  Federal  Government  which  some  regard  as  ac- 
cursed, and  which  they  so  hurry  to  destroy.  I,  for  one,  am 
not  aware  of  any.  If  there  be  any  law  on  the  Federal  statute- 
book  impairing  the  right  of  one  Southern  man,  or  impeaching 
the  equality  of  the  Southern  States  with  the  Northern,  let  it  be 
pointed  out.  The  production  of  it  is  defied.  No  man  has  ever 
shown  it,  and  no  man  ever  can,  because  it  is  not  on  the  statute- 
book.  If  it  be  there,  it  is  easy  to  show  it.  If  I  am  wrong,  let 
my  colleagues  here  set  me  right ;  and  lest,  perhaps,  I  may  be 
in  error,  I  ask  them,  one  and  all — I  appeal  to  you,  Mr.  Speaker, 
to  the  gentleman  from  Madison,  Gen.  Kemper,  to  my  ardent 
disunion  friend  from  Stafford,  Mr.  Seddon,  to  all  the  confessed 
secessionists  in  this  body,  and  to  all  such  outside  of  this  body, 
to  put  their  finger  on  one  Federal  law  in  the  least  degree  in- 
fringing the  constitutional  rights  of  the  South.  If  it  exist, 
let  me  see  it,  that  I  may  recant  the  error. 

More  than  this,  there  is  not  only  no  such  statute  to  be 
(found,  from  1789  to  this  moment,  but  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment has  been  to  the  South  the  most  parental  of  Govern- 
ments. It  has  yielded  to  the  South  all  it  ever  asked  or  de- 
manded. In  1793  the  South  wanted  a  fugitive  slave  law,  and, 
as  it  was  entitled,  received  it.  It  demanded  afterwards  a 
better  and  more  stringent  fugitive  slave  law,  and  it  was  not 


14 

only  granted,  but  the  drafting  of  it  was  left  to  a  Virginia 
Senator  of  the  United  States,  Mr.  Mason.  In  1820,  we 
made  with  the  Federal  Government  a  certain  compact,  the 
celebrated  Missouri  Compromise,  with  which  we  were  then 
so  well  pleased  that  every  Southern  Senator  but  one  voted 
for  it,  and  a  large  majority  of  Southern  representatives.  But 
in  the  course  of  time,  when  the  wave  of  politics  set  high,  and 
politics  became  a  trade,  we  became  dissatisfied  with  the  compro- 
mise of  J  820,  and  we  appealed  to  the  Federal  Government  to 
break  up  the  old,  and  make  a  new  contract.  The  Federal  Gov- 
ernment— this  accursed  Federal  Government  that  we  are  so 
anxious  to  annihilate — took  us  at  our  word,  broke  up  the  old 
and  gave  us  a  new  bargain,  whereby  the  Missouri  Compro- 
mise was  repealed,  and  the  Kansas-Nebraska  pro-slavery 
act  substituted.  The  Federal  Government,  then,  has  not  been 
unkind  or  unjust  to  the  South.  It  has  been  even  especially 
kind  and  parental  to  our  section  ;  and  more  than  this,  the 
South,  by  Northern  accord,  has  had  the  Federal  Administra- 
tion in  its  own  hands  during  nearly  the  whole  period  of  our 
national  existence.  It  has  not  only  had  the  Legislative  and 
Executive  Departments,  but  the  Supreme  Judiciary,  the 
possession  of  which  last  is  priceless  assurance  to  the  South ; 
for  every  good  citizen,  every  lover  of  law  and  order  and  good 
government  will  bow  willing  acquiescence  to  the  decisions 
of  the  Supreme  Court,  and  those  decisions,  whenever  involv- 
ing the  delicate  subject  of  slavery,  have  thus  far  been  all  on 
the  side  of  the  South.  Why,  then,  should  we  of  the  South 
desire  to  part  with  such  a  government  ?  And  why  should  we 
make  such  haste  to  rid  ourselves  of  it  when  we  know,  by  offi- 
cial returns,  that  we  had  at  the  North  at  the  last  election, 
1,600,000  friends  standing  fast  and  faithfully  by  us?  Some 
wrongs  we  are  undoubtedly  suffering  at  the  hands  of  some 
of  the  Northern  States,  as  the  continued  slavery  agitation, 
the  incendiary  effusions  of  a  portion  of  the  Northern  pulpit 
and  press,  the  personal  liberty  statutes,  the  operations  of  the 
underground  railroad,  and  the  emigrant-aid  societies,  and 
the  occasional  non-extradition  of  fugitive  slaves.  These  are 
unquestionably  offences  against  Southern  peace  and  against 
all  good  neighborhood,  and  they  ought  to  cease,  as  1  doubt 
not  in  time  they  will,  or,  at  least,  be  materially  mitigated ; 


15 

but  these  grievances  lie  not  at  the  door  of  that  parental  Fed- 
eral Government,  whose  blessings  drop  upon  us  as  gently  as 
the  dews  of  Heaven,  nor  are  they  now  for  the  first  time  ex- 
isting. They  existed  and  we  endured  them  under  the  demo- 
cratic administrations  of  Mr.  Polk,  Mr.  Pierce,  and  Mr.  Bu- 
chanan, never  dreaming  of  making  them  a  cause  for  the  dis- 
solution of  the  Union  ;  and  I  presume  if  Mr.  Breckenridge 
had  been  elected  they  would  never  have  been  even  heard  of 
as  causes  for  disruption.  Patiently  and  meekly  we  bore  these 
grievances  when  democratic  Presidents  held  sway,  but  under 
the  rule  of  Mr.  Lincoln  they  become  wrongs  so  enormous 
and  intolerable,  that,  for  them",  we  must  in  an  instant  shiver 
this  blessed  Union  into  fragments. 

But  the  practical  inquiry  here  arises — that  which  so  much 
concerns  the  masses  of  the  people — shall  we  redress  these 
grievances,  or  make  them  lighter,  or  remedy  any  wrong  by  dis- 
union i  Most  assuredly  not.  Whatever  ills  we  are  suffering, 
will  be  a  thousand  times  aggravated  by  a  separation  of  the 
States.  The  slavery  agitation  will  be  intensified  ;  we  shall 
lose  scores  of  slaves  where  now  we  lose  one,  because,  by 
the  abolition  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law.  and  by  reason  of 
the  readier  facilities  for  escape,  there  will  be  no  effectual  im- 
pediment to  such  escape  ;  the  underground  railroad  will  be 
sped,  and  its  operations  vastly  extended ;  emigrant-aid  so- 
cieties will  be  augmented  in  number,  and  means,  and  effici- 
ency ;  and  for  one  Henry  AVard  Beecher  and  Garrison's 
Liberator,  we  shall  have  a  thousand.  The  alienation 
which  will  be  left  behind  disunion,  the  bitter  and  deep- 
seated  sectional  hates  and  incessant  border  feuds  and  wars 
that  must  and  will  flow  from  the  source  of  disruption,  will 
as  surely  bring  about  these  lamentable  results  as  God's  sun 
will  send  down  his  rays  upon  the  earth  when  his  broad  disc 
glories  above  the  horizon. 

These  Senate  resolutions,  Mr.  Speaker,  are  evidently  de- 
signed as  a  stepping-stone  to  the  secession  of  the  State — as  the 
entering  wedge — the  preliminary  notice — a  scheme  to  "  fire  " 
the  Virginia  heart,  and  rush  us  out  of  the  Union  ;  and,  so  regard- 
ing them,  I  might  inquire  by  what  warrant  it  is  we  may  retire 


16 

from  tlie  confederacy  ?  But  I  shall  not  argue  this  doctrine  of 
secession.  The  simple  history  of  the  Constitution ;  its  simpler 
and  yet  plainer  reading  ;  the  overwhelming  authority  of  our 
fathers  against  it ;  the  crushing  weight  of  opinion  against  it  in 
our  own  State — her  Jefferson  declaring  that  even  the  old  Con- 
federation, a  government  far  weaker  than  the  present  Federal 
Union,  possessed  the  power  of  coercion — her  Madison,  the 
very  father  of  the  Constitution,  solemnly  asserting  that  its 
framers  never  for  one  moment  contemplated  so  disorganizing 
and  ruinous  a  principle — her  great  and  good  Marshall  decree- 
ing more  than  once,  from  the  bench  of  the  Supreme  Judiciary, 
that  the  Federal  Constitution  did  not  constitute  a  mere  com- 
pact or  treaty,  but  a  government  of  the  whole  people  of  the 
United  States,  with  supreme  powers  within  the  sphere  of  its 
authority — Judge  Spencer  Roane,  the  Ajax  Telamon,  in  his 
day,  of  her  State-rights  republicanism,  endorsing  the  senti- 
ment :  "  It  is  treason  to  secede !" — her  Thomas  Ritchie,  the 
"  Napoleon  of  the  Press"  and  Jupiter  Tonans  of  the  modern 
democracy,  heralding  through  the  columns  of  the  Richmond 
Enquirer,  the  impregnable  maxims  that  c'no  association  of 
men,  no  State  or  set  of  States  has  a  right  to  withdraw  from 
the  Union  of  its  own  accord,"  and  that  "  the  first  act  of  resist- 
ance to  the  law  is  treason  to  the  United  States  ;"  the  decis- 
ions of  some  of  the  most  enlightened  of  the  State  judiciaries 
in  repudiation  of  the  dangerous  dogma ;  the  concurrent  disa- 
vowal of  it  by  the  Marshalls,  and  Kents,  and  Storys,  and 
McLeans,  and  Waynes,  and  Catrons,  and  Reverdy  Johnsons, 
and  Guthries,  and  all  the  really  great  jurists  of  the  land ;  the 
b>rand  of  absurdity  and  wickedness  which  has  been  stamped 
npon  it  by  Andrew  Jackson,  and  Webster,  and  Clay,  and  Crit- 
tenden, and  Everett,  and  Douglass,  and  Cass,  and  Holt,  and 
Andrew  Johnson,  and  Wickliffe,  and  Dickinson,  and  the  great 
body  of  our  truly  eminent  statesmen :  these  considerations  and 
authorities  present  the  doctrine  of  secession  to  me  with  one 
side  only. 

But  I  do  wish  to  inquire  of  my  colleagues,  if  they  have 
seriously  reflected  on  the  consequences  of  secession,  should  it 
come? 

Do  you  expect  (as  I  have  heard  some  of  you  declare)  that 


17 

the  power  and  influence  of  Virginia  are  such  that  you  will 
have  peaceable  secession,  through  an  immediate  recogni- 
tion of  the  separate  independence  of  the  South  i  Alas  !  you 
hug  a  delusion. 

Peaceable  secession — secession  without  w  ar  !  You  can  no 
more  have  it  than  you  can  crush  in  the  rack  every  limb  and 
bone  of  the  human  frame  without  agonizing  the  mutilated 
trunk.  u  Peaceable  secession  !  (said  Mr.  Webster)  peaceable 
secession  !  Sir  (continued  the  "  great  expounder  "),  your  eyes 
and  mine  are  not  destined  to  see  that  miracle.  The  dismem- 
berment of  this  vast  country  without  convulsion  !  The  break- 
ing up  of  the  gyftsfr  fountains  of  the  deep  without  ruffling  the  <yu& 
surface  I"  No  !  Secede  when  you  will,  you  will  have  war  in  all 
its  horrors  :  there  is  no  escape.  The  President  of  the  United 
States  is  sworn  to  see  that  the  laws  be  faithfully  executed,  and 
he  must  and  will — as  Gen.AYa^liington  did,  and  as  Gen.  Jacket  m 
would  have  done  in  1833 — use  the  army,  and  the  navy,  and  the 
militia,  to  execute  the  laws  and  defend  the  government.  If  he 
does  not,  he  will  be  a  perjured  man.  Besides,  you  cannot  bring 
the  people  of  the  South  to  a  perfect  union  for  secession. 
There  are  those — and  "  their  name  is  legion  " — whom  no  in- 
timidation can  drive  into  the  disunion  ranks.  They  love  the 
old  Union  which  their  fathers  transmitted  to  them,  and  under 
which  their  country  has  become  great,  and  under  which  they 
and  their  children  have  been  free  and  happy.  Circumstances 
may  repress  their  sentiments  for  a  while,  but  in  their  hearts 
they  love  the  Union ;  and  the  first  hour  they  shall  be  free  to 
speak  and  to  act,  they  will  gather  under,  and  send  up  their 
joyous  shouts  for,  the  Stars  and  Stripes.  They  will  not  fight 
with  you  against  the  flag ;  so  that  there  must  be  a  double  war 
— a  Federal  war,  and  a  war  among  ourselves.  And  it  may 
be  that  whole  States  may  refuse  to  join  in  the  secession  move- 
ment (which  is  most  probable),  and  then  we  shall  witness  the 
revolting  spectacle  of  one  Southern  State  warring  against  and 
in  deadly  conflict  with  another ;  and  then,  alas  !  will  be  over 
our  unhappy  country  a  reign  of  terror  none  the  less  terrific 
than  that  which  deluded  with  blood  and  strewed  with  carnage 
revolutionary  France. 

Supposing,  then,  the  State  to  have  seceded,  and  war  to 


18 

have  opened,  what  trophies  do  yon  look  for  ? — what  are  you  to 
gain  ? 

Will  you  win  greater  security  for  the  institution  of  slavery 
in  the  States  1  You  do  not  want  it.  None"  except  demented 
abolitionists  assail  it.  The  Supreme  Court  has  raised  an  im- 
pregnable bulwark  for  its  defence.  And  even  the  Bepublican 
party  (as  already  remarked)  has  voluntarily  tendered  you  an 
amendment  of  the  Constitution  forever  guaranteeing  slavery 
in  the  States  against  even  the  touch  of  Federal  legislation. 
"Hands  off!"  is  their  emphatic  warning  to  the  abolitionists. 

Will  you  strengthen  your  claim  to  the  common  Territories 
— advance  your  privilege  of  carrying  your  slaves  thither? 
Here,  too,  the  Supreme  Court,  by  the  Drecl  Scott  decision,  has 
settled  your  rights ;  and  the  administration  party  in  Congress 
have  abandoned  the  Wilmot  Proviso— passed  territorial  laws 
without  any  slavery  restriction  whatever — thus  leaving  every 
slave-holder  in  the  South  free  to  enter  the  Territories  with  his 
slaves,  and  even  throwing  the  aegis  of  judicial  protection  over 
that  species  of  property  when  there.  Moreover,  what  care  you 
for  this  Territorial  right  \  It  is  of  not  the  least  practical  con- 
cern. Slavery  will  go  wherever  it  is  profitable,  just  as  sure  as 
water  finds  its  level.  No  human  legislation  can  prevent  it,  be- 
cause the  instincts  of  the  human  constitution  and  the  laws  of 
soil  and  climate  are  stronger  than  any  law-giving  of  finite 
man.  Just  as  sure  will  slavery  never  go  where  soil  and  climate 
forbid.  Now,  in  none  of  the  Territories  do  the  laws  of  soil 
and  climate  allow  slaves  to  abide.  Thus,  in  New  Mexico, 
wdiich  is  five  times  as  large  as  the  State  of  New  York,  and  where 
slavery  exists  by  law,  being  recognized  and  protected  by  a  slave- 
code,  there  are,  according  to  the  late  census,  but  twenty-six 
slaves,  and  they  are  the  body-servants  of  officers  of  the  civil 
government  and  of  the  army  !  Why,  then,  should  the  North 
care  to  exclude  slavery  from  Territories  from  which  God  and 
nature  have  ordained  its  exclusion  ;  and  what  should  the  South 
<>are  for  the  right  to  carry  slaves  where  almighty  God  has 
decreed  they  shall  never  go  ?  Of  what  practical  value  to  the 
South  is  a  privilege  which,  admitted,  has  carried  to  an  area 
five  times  the  territorial  extent  of  New,  York  only  twenty-six 


19 

slaves  ?  Now,  I  ask,  if  for  so  worthless  a  boon  we  shall  give 
up  this  great  and  glorious  Union,  whose  benefits  are  pre-emi- 
nently practical,  and  as  genial  and  numerous  as  they  are  prac- 
tical ?  And  shall  we  aggravate  our  folly  by  stickling  for  this 
right  to  the  point  of  disunion,  when  the  right,  if  worth  any- 
thing, is  fortified  and  secured  by  the  decision  of  the  highest 
judicial  tribunal  of  the  land,  and  controverted  by  none  i 
Shall  we  go  to  war,  and  to  civil  war,  for  a  bauble  so  empty  and 
worthless  ? 

But  it  is  often  insisted  that  we  may  hereafter  acquire  terri- 
tory adapted  to  slavery,  and  that  then  we  may  be  denied  our 
rights.  Well,  "sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the  evil  thereof." 
When  those  things  happen,  and  the  evil  is  upon  us,  or  obvi- 
ously approaching,  it  will  be  quite  time  enough  to  get  ready 
for  resistance  and  defence.  But,  in  God's  name,  let  us  not 
take  disunion  u  by  the  forelock."  Let  us  not,  in  mere  antici- 
pation of  evils  that  may  never  reach,  and  of  wrongs  that  may 
be  never  done  us,  destroy  the  best  government  that  man  was 
ever  blessed  with,  and  under  whose  happy  auspices  we,  the 
people  of  the  United  States,  have  attained  a  growth,  and  gran- 
deur, and  power,  and  freedom,  and  prosperity,  and  happiness, 
unparalleled,  for  so  brief  a  period,  in  the  history  of  the  nations 
of  the  earth. 

Nor  shall  we  lose  by  waiting.  We  are  not  prepared  now  for 
war.  We  have  few  of  the  materials  of  war.  We  have  no 
arms,  no  ships,  no  forts,  little  or  no  commerce,  no  manufac- 
tures— all  of  which  are  indispensables  of  war.  Suddenly  go- 
ing to  war,  we  should  be  at  a  great  disadvantage  in  every 
respect,  except  in  the  unflinching  bravery  and  indomitable 
spirit  of  our  people.  Waiting  for  some  actual  and  dangerous 
aggression,  and  in  the  meantime  preparing  for  the  worst,  if 
the  signs  indicate  the  necessity,  we  shall  be  in  a  condition  to 
meet  our  foes  whenever  and  wherever  they  come. 

Shall  we,  by  secession  and  war,  lose  fewer  slaves  by  obtain- 
ing a  better  execution  of  the  fugitive  slave  law  {  Why,  by  se- 
cession vou  annul  the  fugitive  slave  law,  and  forfeit  all  its  ben- 
efits.  Moreover,  you  bring  Canada,  the  great  asylum  for  fu- 
gitive slaves,  to  the  Virginia  line  ;  so  that,  to  get  his  freedom, 


20 

a  slave  has  but  to  cross  a  narrow  stream  or  an  imaginary- 
line  ;  and,  by  voiding  all  obligation  to  return  fugitives,  and 
discouraging  all  willingness  to  do  so,  you  create  other  asy- 
lums north  of  us,  immediately  contiguous  to  the  border  Slave 
States — the  inevitable  consequence  of  which  will  be,  not  only 
that  those  States  will  lose  a  much  larger  number  of  slaves 
than  heretofore,  but  that  in  a  few  years  slavery  will  disappear 
from  them  altogether. 

The  truth  is,  there  is  but  one  safety  for  the  slave  inter- 
ests of  the  border  States,  and  that  is  in  having  friendly 
neighbors  on  the  north  of  them,  and  not  only  friendly  neigh- 
bors, but  friendly,  stringent,  coercive,  penal  legislation.  With 
Pennsylvania,  and  Ohio,  and  Indiana,  and  Illinois,  and  Iowa, 
made  enemies  of — as  enemies,  and  bitter  enemies,  secession 
will  surely  make  them — no  human  power  can  prevent  the 
extinction  of  slavery  in  the  States  of  Virginia,  Maryland,  Ken- 
tucky, and  Missouri.  Fire  will  not  more  effectually  reduce 
the  faggot  to  cinders,  or  water  extinguish  flame,  than  seces- 
sion will  bring  slavery  in  those  States  to  annihilation. 

To  bring  the  matter  home,  if  with  a  stringent  fugitive 
slave  law,  executed  (as  I  think)  with  all  reasonable  fidelity 
and  success,  and  with  friends  North  of  us  acknowledging  the 
obligation  to  execute  its  provisions,  and  reasonably  willing 
to  do  so — I  say,  if  under  these  favorable  circumstances  we 
now  lose  slaves  enough  to  make  us  feel  the  loss,  and  excite 
alarm,  how  infinitely  greater  will  be  the  loss  and  the  dan- 
ger when  the  facilities  of  escape  shall  be  infinitely  multi- 
plied, when  we  shall  have  no  law  to  enforce  our  rights,  and 
none  to  help  us  but  embittered  and  spiteful  enemies. 

Shall  we,  by  secession  and  war,  get  clear  of  the  personal 
liberty  bills?  Quite  the  contrary.  Not  half  the  Free  States 
have  as  yet  enacted  personal  liberty  laws.  All  of  them  will 
pass  them  if  you  break  up  the  Union.  Revenge  will  do  its 
worjt,  and  the  enactments  it  will  dictate  will  be  far  more 
inimical  to  the  interests  of  the  slaveholders  than  any  that 
now  blot  the  statute-books  of  the  North.  Besides,  time,  re- 
flection, and  better  understanding  may  lead  to  the  repeal  of 
all  these  offensive  statutes. 


SI 

So  far  from  strengthening  the  institution  of  slavery  by 
secession,  we  shall  weaken,  if  not  destroy  it.  If  the  war 
which  disunion  is  to  bring  with  it  shall  continue  for  a  few 
years,  England  and  France,  cut  off  from  their  supplies  of 
American  cotton,  will  seek  them  from  other  sources  ;  and 
as  it  is  well  ascertained  that  cotton  can  be  grown  to  any  ex- 
tent in  India,  Australia,  South  America,  Central  America, 
the  West  Indies,  and  other  parts  of  the  globe,  the  new  sources 
of  supply  will  be  found.  India  already  furnishes  to  Engiaud 
per  annum  Q00, 000  frff  bales.  And  the  high  prices  which 
the  article  will  command  during  the  continuance  of  the  war, 
and  the  opening  of  railroads  to  transport  it  to  the  sea,  will 
so  stimulate  the  production  that,  before  the  lapse  of  many 
years,  England  and  France  will  not  be  dependent  on  the 
Southern  States  for  their  supplies,  and  the  Southern  cotton 
monopoly  being  thus  gone,  what  will  slavery  be  worth  \ 
And  what  will  the  Cotton  States  be  worth  without  slavery  i 

In  my  judgment,  there  is  no  safety  for  this  institution  save 
in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  There  it  is  recog- 
nised and  protected.  No  other  property  is  specially  pro- 
tected. Slaves  are  represented  ;  no  other  property  is.  This 
Union  of  ours  is  the  great  bulwark  of  slavery.  No  where 
else  has  it  flourished  ;  and  break  up  the  Union  when  you 
will,  you  knock  away  its  strongest  prop.  A  Southern  Con- 
federacy will  be  to  it  its  deadliest  blast,  if  not  its  grave. 
The  whole  civilized  world  is  intensely  hostile  to  slavery  ; 
and  the  moment  a  new  confederacy  is  formed,  based  on  the 
single  idea  of  slavery,  numerous  and  malignant  antagonisms 
will  be  provoked  which  may  endanger  the  institution.  But 
under  the  shield  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  these 
antagonisms,  whether  foreign  or  domestic,  are,  and  ever  will 
be,  harmless.  In  that  blessed  instrument  it  is  a  recognised 
institution — part  and  parcel  of  our  frame  of  government,  and 
of  our  social  and  industrial  system — to  the  protection  of 
which  the  entire  power  of  the  great  Government  of  the  United 
States  stands  pledged  before  the  entire  world.  Thus  secure 
under  the  wing  of  the  Union,  why  shall  we  risk  its  security 
by  rushing  on  untried  experiments  { 

Then  we  gain   nothing   for  our  peculiar  institution  by  se- 


22 

cession.  For  what,  then,  are  we  plunging  into  the  dark 
abyss  of  disunion  %  In  God's  name  tell  me.  I  vow  I  do  not 
know,  nor  have  I  ever  heard  one  sensible  or  respectable  rea- 
son assigned  for  this  harsh  resort.  We  shall  lose  every- 
thing; gain  nothing  but  war,  blood,  carnage,  famine,  starva- 
tion, social  desolation,  wretchedness  in  all  its  aspects,  ruin 
in  all  its  forms.  We  shall  gain  a  taxation,  to  be  levied  by 
the  new  government,  that  will  eat  out  the  substance  of  the 
people,  and  *'  make  them  poor  indeed?"  We  shall  gain  ali- 
enation and  distrust  in  all  the  dear  relations  of  life.  We 
shall  gain  ill  blood  between  father  and  son,  and  brother  and 
brother,  and  neighbor  and  neighbor.  Bereaved  widowhood 
and  helpless  orphanage  we  shall  gain  to  our  hearts'  content. 
Lamentation,  and  mourning,  and  agonized  hearts  we  shall 
gain  in  every  corner  where  "  wild  war's  deadly  blast "  shall 
blow.  We  shall  gain  the  prostration  —  most  lamentable 
calamity  will  it  be — of  that  great  system  of  internal  de- 
velopment, which  the  statesmen  of  Virginia  have  looked 
to  as  the  basis  of  all  her  future  progress  and  grandeur,  and 
the  great  hope  of  her  speedy  regeneration  and  redemption. 
We  shall  gain  repudiation;  not  that  Virginia  will  ever  be 
reluctant  to  redeem  her  engagements,  but  that  she  will 
be  disabled  by  the  heavy  burdens  of  secession  and  war.  We 
shall  gain  the  blockade  of  our  ports,  and  entire  exclu- 
sion from  the  commerce,  and  markets,  and  store-houses  of 
the.  world.  We  shall  gain  the  hardest  times  the  people  of 
this  once  happy  country  have  known  this  side  the  War  of 
Independence.  I  know  not,  indeed,  of  one  single  interest  of 
Virginia  that  will  not  be  wrecked  by  disunion.  And,  enter- 
taining these  views,  I  do  shrink  with  horror  from  the  very 
idea  of  the  secession  of  the  State.  I  can  never  assent  to  the 
fatal  measure.  No  !  I  am  for  the  Union  yet.  Call  me  submis- 
sionist  or  traitor,  or  what  else  you  will,  I  am  for  the  Union — 
as  I  said  upon  another  occasion,  (t  while  Hope's  light  flickers 
in  the  socket."  In  Daniel  Webster's  immortal  words, k*  Give 
me  Liberty  and  Union,  now  and  forever  one  and  inseparable." 
And  if  I  may  presume  to  tender  an  humble  exhortation  to 
my  colleagues  in  this  hall,  I  would  say  to  them,  as  I  said  to 
a  number  of  my  respected  constituents  who  recently  called 
on  me  for  my  views  of  the  crisis  that  besets  us — ''As  Wash- 


23 

ington  advised  all  his  countrymen,  cling  fondly  to  the  Union 
Take  every  chance  to  save  it.  Conference  with  the  Border 
States,  convention  of  the  Slave  States,  general  convention  of* 
all  the  States — try  these  and  all  other  conceivable  mean 
saving  the  Union  from  wreck.  And  when  all  conceivable 
expedients  shall  have  seemingly  failed,  if  there  be  but  one 
faint  ray  of  hope,  let  that  light  you  to  yet  one  more  effort 
to  save  it." 


Erratum  — The  first  sentence  on  page  13,  commencing:  with  the  word  "  Has,' 
and  ending  with  the  word  "Abolitionists,"  should  come  iD  after  the  word  'for- 
bidden" near  bottom  of  page  12 


Hollinger  Corp. 
pH  8.5 


